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Shooter May Have Considered Other Targets In Chicago And Las Vegas

Authorities say the Las Vegas gunman may have considered other music festivals to target, including Chicago's Lollapalooza, shown here in July 2016.

Getty Images for Samsung, Gabriel Grams

After the horrible massacre at a Las Vegas music festival on Sunday night that killed 58 and wounded hundreds more, concerns emerged immediately about other sites that could be vulnerable to a similar attack.

New evidence now raises the prospect that the shooter who terrorized the Route 91 Harvest Festival may have considered other targets, including the Lollapalooza music festival in Chicago’s Grant Park and the Life Is Beautiful festival in downtown Las Vegas.

The Blackstone Hotel, which sits across Michigan Avenue from Grant Park, confirmed on Thursday that a reservation was made under the name Stephen Paddock in August during Lollapalooza. That festival attracts hundreds of thousands of people to the downtown Chicago park, which is framed by tall buildings.

But the 21-story hotel says that no one by that name actually checked into the hotel during the festival, and authorities have not confirmed that it was the same person as the Las Vegas shooter.

The Chicago Police Department says it is aware of the reports of a Stephen Paddock booking a room at the hotel, and the department has been in communication with federal agencies.

Las Vegas Sheriff Joseph Lombardo said in a press conference Wednesday evening that Paddock had previously stayed at a Las Vegas high-rise condo during a music festival the weekend before the shooting.

Lombardo said Paddock booked a room at the 21-story Ogden condo building via Airbnb, during the three-day Life Is Beautiful festival in downtown Las Vegas. Lombardo said that it wasn’t immediately known if Paddock had planned an attack on that event.

Sunday’s shooting happened along the Las Vegas Strip, an area brimming with hotels and casinos located in unincorporated Clark County, just south of the Las Vegas city limits.